THE SCI­ENCE OF WANT­ING MORE

The con­vic­tion that life would be bet­ter on the other side of the fence af­fects some people more than oth­ers – borne out by sci­en­tific tri­als on a scale of op­ti­mism ver­sus pes­simism. “Re­cent re­search into what ex­perts call the locus of con­trol has dis­cov­ered there are both ‘in­ter­nal’ and ‘ex­ter­nal’ thinkers,” ex­plains psy­chol­o­gist Sue Firth. “The first group will re­gard other people’s suc­cess­ful lives and re­alise that if they want the same, they need to take re­spon­si­bil­ity for mak­ing it hap­pen. The sec­ond group, how­ever, don’t have the same mind­set; ex­ter­nal thinkers be­lieve that they can’t con­trol their des­tiny and blame other forces – such as cir­cum­stances or people – that pre­vent them get­ting there. These are most likely the ones who feel life’s not fair.”